1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the transmission, receipt, and presentation of vehicle specific environmental conditions and hazards information.
2. Description of Related Art
Whether planning a flight, flying a pre-planned route, or altering a flight en route, pilots need up-to-date, accurate information on the environmental conditions that they are likely to encounter. Environmental conditions can include, for example, meteorological and other environmental conditions, such as, storms, rain, turbulence, lightning, icing, fog, volcanic ash, wind speed, wind direction, wind variation, or the like. Before a flight begins, available environmental conditions information must, at the very least, alert the pilot to the environmental conditions for the departure location, the arrival location, and the intended travel route. During the flight, the pilot must be able to access updated environmental conditions information for not only the present location of the aircraft, but also for the remainder of the intended travel route, the arrival location, and any alternate routes that may be used in case of emergency.
To accomplish this, the pilot typically receives environmental conditions information in the form of various maps, printouts, and/or displays that detail environmental conditions that the aircraft is likely to encounter. Some of the information sources, such as, for example, pressure or jet-stream maps, make the pilot aware of environmental conditions that affect the aircraft directly, such as, for example, wind speed. Other sources of information, such as, for example, radar reflectivity maps, or Nexrad data, advise the pilot of conditions that affect the aircraft indirectly. For example, raindrops, which do not affect the aircraft directly, appear as areas of high reflectivity on radar reflectivity maps and infer areas of turbulence.
The pilot must then compare all of the environmental conditions information that he or she receives with his or her knowledge, experience, and judgment, to determine a navigable course through the maze of environmental conditions.
To help the pilot to assimilate the vast amount of information, it is known to transmit weather data to the cockpit of an aircraft so that the weather data can be displayed and periodically updated. For example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,265,024, to Crabill et al., describes a system for providing systematic, updated, weather information from the ground to the pilot. The '024 patent includes processor and display systems that display weather data in map-style depictions and as alphanumeric formats. The '024 patent also describes a display that provides overlays of mosaicked ground weather maps, lightning, and other Significant Meteorological Statements (Sigmets).
As an example of displaying environmental conditions information to a pilot, it is known to use enhanced weather radar to measure wind variations in an area ahead of an aircraft. The wind variation measurements are then processed to determine regions of potentially hazardous wind shear. These determined regions are then displayed on a map as a series of variable sized, color-coded pie shapes. The different color codes represent different intensities of wind variation, while the size of each pie shape shows an approximate size of the hazardous area. By understanding the color codes and the size variations of these displayed pie shapes, the pilot can take appropriate actions to negotiate a way through a hazardous area or avoid the hazardous area completely, without flying into another hazardous area.